


let's make a deal

by Jayne L (JayneL)



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Episode: s05e04 The End, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-08-14
Updated: 2014-08-14
Packaged: 2018-02-13 03:19:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 775
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2135094
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JayneL/pseuds/Jayne%20L
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Aaron Birch in Endverse.</p>
            </blockquote>





	let's make a deal

**Author's Note:**

> It's August 2014. The End is nigh.

Christopher dies. No, Christopher is killed. Christopher is _murdered_ , and his name is dragged through bullshit racist mud by bullshit racist cops, and Aaron won't just take it, he _won't_.

He doesn't actually expect his prayers to be answered. He really doesn't expect them to be answered by an impatient white guy wearing a douchey V-neck shirt and a puckered scar across half his face, who appears at the foot of Aaron's bed one night looking like he's been assigned the most beneath-him scut work imaginable. "Fear not, Aaron Birch," he says, his accented voice nearly toneless with boredom, "for your pleas have reached the ears of Heaven, and this angel has been sent to you to do God's work. Rejoice, or whatever."

But when Aaron tells him he wants his brother back, the angel scoffs. "Oh, well, I'm afraid that's completely out of the question. Perhaps it will comfort you, Aaron, to know that your brother is in Heaven, and that Heaven is loathe to relinquish even one of its souls. Especially in the current climate." He raises one hand as if to touch the scar on his cheek, but redirects himself before he can, crossing his arms over his chest instead. "We're suffering enough of an energy crisis as it is."

Angels aren't supposed to be like this. They're not supposed to appear to the faithful as condescending Eurotrash, or act like answering a prayer's some huge imposition. Aaron fights down furious, frustrated tears. "Why are you even here if you're not gonna help me?"

"Did I say I wasn't going to help you?" The angel gives him an exasperated look. "Ask for something I can _give_."

Aaron struggles for calm, struggles to think. Chris is dead. Chris is in Heaven, at least--at least there's that, he hugs it close, at _least_ \--and if he can't get him back, then-- "I want them to pay. The guys who killed him. Chris wasn't doing anything wrong, but those cops made everybody think he deserved to get shot. He didn't. Those cops? _They_ deserve it." He looks up at the angel. "That's what I want. Justice for my brother."

Something unreadable--tired, but unreadable--flickers in the angel's eyes. "Don't we all."

Aaron raises his chin, refusing to let it wobble. "Is that something you can give?"

The angel blinks. Whatever emotion threatened to show in his eyes disappears as if it never existed. "I think it could be arranged," he says breezily, and uncrosses his arms and claps his hands together like a man getting down to business. "All right, Aaron. Let's make a deal."

* * *

Twenty months later, Aaron wakes abruptly in the middle of the night to the feeling of something he hadn't really known was there going away. Blinking out. Leaving him.

(In a scrapyard in Sioux Falls, South Dakota, Castiel's knees buckle and he hits the gravel like something's slammed him down and he screams.

The angels leave, the song of the Host falls silent, and Cas _screams_.)

He lies still for a while, trying to figure out what it was. Presses his palm to his chest, feels his heart thudding away. His pulse stays steady even when the low rumble of a patrol passes by outside, their searchlight cutting in around the edges of his blackout blinds. He wonders at that a little. Curfew patrols usually churn him up inside, all angry and frustrated and afraid, but he's fine now, doesn't feel anything in particular about the patrol one way or the other. Since it doesn't make sense to be concerned about being fine, Aaron stops thinking about it.

For the same reason, he decides he's not too worried about the feeling that woke him up. Whatever he's missing doesn't worry him. In fact, he feels calm. Lighter, somehow. Clearer. Unburdened. He's not even tired anymore.

He is hungry, though. Meals have been smaller and scarcer since the state instituted those stupid new grocery restrictions--if everybody's on food stamps now, and you can only buy the food that's specified on the stamp, what the hell happened to all the food you can't get stamps for? Like, did the oceans suddenly just run out of fish?--and the toast and beans he shared with Dad for dinner barely stopped his stomach rumbling 'til he finished washing the dishes. He's _hungry_.

_That's_ something he feels a need to address.

As he's tugging on his jeans, the quiet night is obliterated by the patrol's siren blaring out down the street: once, twice, followed by unintelligible shouting and a staccato burst of gunfire.

Aaron doesn't even pause. Screw curfew. He needs food.

**Author's Note:**

> The parenthesis about Cas is from my 'The End' coda, Epilogue.


End file.
